You have forgotten that MSFT and YHOO are far more diversified than you give them credit for. MSFT will be selling OS's for many many years to come and there's a place in the market for that. Plus they have a fledgling suite of business products that neither GOOG nor AAPL have been able to penetrate.
Be careful who you write-off in this world. That said, I agree that the pace of innovation has been poor at MSFT and they need to start getting more creative. However, I think they do need to merge their search engines and advertising platforms to achieve the scale it will take to keep and win over advertisers while improving the user's experience.
I wasn't focused so much on the information being conveyed - rather that Mathematics was invented to communicate the underlying ideas/principles. Depending on the nature of what you're trying to explain, 2/8 may be more appropriate than 1/4 - even though they represent the same ratio.
Perhaps one could argue that pi is just humans only way to describe the relationship. Its natural "non-roundness" could be better described in some other manner that we have yet to invent or have no capability to understand with our intellects.
Mathematics is just a language to describe the physical world around us. As with any language, it is created not bestowed. After all, if 1/4 = 0.25 = (2 * 1)/8 then aren't these three ways of describing the same information.
I'm not saying the relationships and order in the universe don't exist independent of our discovery of those relationships. But mathematics is not the same as the relationship - merely a language to describe it, and as such, it is invented.
Totally agree. To take it one step further, bloggers as a whole are trying to prove that they are the same as journalists. The difference is that journalists work for organizations that demand them to maintain certain standards of ethics. Those ethics vary to some degree but I'm sure if a CNet or CNN reported pulled this stunt, they would fire the individual and issue an immediate apology. However with bloggers, there is no recourse because so many of them are individuals that define their own standards. Some are outstanding and some are scum. Unfortunately, the Giz folks have tarnished the reputation of the entire blogging community by doing this. Bad news travels fast and this will take time to repair.
Sorry, but I was not impressed with this article. First off, it was not bad programming that killed off late '90s ecommerce startups. It was flawed business models. In fact, I would say that unless you're selling software or some kind of technology service, it is highly unlikely that even a crap programming team will derail your firm if you have a fundamentally solid business model. So the backdrop for this article is flawed because it assumes that programming talent defines business success. Secondly, this article does not (as the title suggests) tell you HOW to recognize a good programmer. It attempts to define WHAT a good programmer possesses. There's a big difference between WHAT and HOW. If you want to know HOW to spot if someone is intelligent can be significantly more challenging than simply saying "I want someone smart". Furthermore, it misses one of the biggest points for a successful programmer - namely, Communication Skills! If a programmer can not articulate their understanding of the requirements and communicate back issues, concerns, and ideas, then you are taking a major risk. It doesn't matter that they COULD HAVE programmed the next BIG THING.... if they didn't understand the requirements, they will have wasted their time (and someone's money). And what about being able to work with the business and communicate ideas? How about time management and multitasking skills? I would hire a mediocre developer with solid communication skills and a willingness to learn over someone with top 1% programming talent who can't communicate a sentence properly. Ok, I'm done ranting.
After all, it does work! I mean, I can't wait to have to set the WEP Key on my wireless power router! "Honey, why did the power go out?" "Wait, I'm going to reset the router!"
Wouldn't it just be easier to show up naked at the airport with just your ID and a credit card? For one thing, your shoes will already be off:-)
Stop improving the technology and just change the business process!
I'm always amazed when I hear something positive like this that it hits me, "Wait, you mean they've been printing out tons of paper for years when they could have been doing this?!"
Now the scary part is that I've read that Bush isn't really computer savvy. I wonder if he'll work off of hard copy?
Although I don't disagree at a high-level with Matt, this is also a bit of a stretch. The way I see it, Google's algorithm is far from perfect. All too often, I search for something and get results back from web sites that don't deserve to be at the top of the list but are not necessarily doing any kind of black-hat SEO. For whatever reason, Google incorrectly bestows traffic (and therefore revenue) to these sites that appear at the top. So would you blame someone who has a better web site from "pushing the envelope a bit"? To say that this behavior automatically constitutes some degree of moral decrepitude is a bit of a stretch. There are behaviors that are clearly wrong and I wholeheartedly disagree with them. But to expect perfection from the masses when Google's search results themselves are not perfect is a bit hypocritical in my view.
Another way of putting it: It's easy for Google to sit back and say you do this and that to web site owners while Google's making Billions and so many sites are barely able to survive despite good quality content and top-notch intentions. Worse still is that Google has a "diversity problem" in my opinion. Top 10 search results will be from only 4 or 5 sites instead of from 10 different sites so you have more options to choose from. But what do I know.
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You have forgotten that MSFT and YHOO are far more diversified than you give them credit for. MSFT will be selling OS's for many many years to come and there's a place in the market for that. Plus they have a fledgling suite of business products that neither GOOG nor AAPL have been able to penetrate. Be careful who you write-off in this world. That said, I agree that the pace of innovation has been poor at MSFT and they need to start getting more creative. However, I think they do need to merge their search engines and advertising platforms to achieve the scale it will take to keep and win over advertisers while improving the user's experience.
I agree.
I wasn't focused so much on the information being conveyed - rather that Mathematics was invented to communicate the underlying ideas/principles. Depending on the nature of what you're trying to explain, 2/8 may be more appropriate than 1/4 - even though they represent the same ratio.
Perhaps one could argue that pi is just humans only way to describe the relationship. Its natural "non-roundness" could be better described in some other manner that we have yet to invent or have no capability to understand with our intellects. Mathematics is just a language to describe the physical world around us. As with any language, it is created not bestowed. After all, if 1/4 = 0.25 = (2 * 1)/8 then aren't these three ways of describing the same information. I'm not saying the relationships and order in the universe don't exist independent of our discovery of those relationships. But mathematics is not the same as the relationship - merely a language to describe it, and as such, it is invented.
Totally agree. To take it one step further, bloggers as a whole are trying to prove that they are the same as journalists. The difference is that journalists work for organizations that demand them to maintain certain standards of ethics. Those ethics vary to some degree but I'm sure if a CNet or CNN reported pulled this stunt, they would fire the individual and issue an immediate apology. However with bloggers, there is no recourse because so many of them are individuals that define their own standards. Some are outstanding and some are scum. Unfortunately, the Giz folks have tarnished the reputation of the entire blogging community by doing this. Bad news travels fast and this will take time to repair.
Sorry, but I was not impressed with this article. First off, it was not bad programming that killed off late '90s ecommerce startups. It was flawed business models. In fact, I would say that unless you're selling software or some kind of technology service, it is highly unlikely that even a crap programming team will derail your firm if you have a fundamentally solid business model. So the backdrop for this article is flawed because it assumes that programming talent defines business success. Secondly, this article does not (as the title suggests) tell you HOW to recognize a good programmer. It attempts to define WHAT a good programmer possesses. There's a big difference between WHAT and HOW. If you want to know HOW to spot if someone is intelligent can be significantly more challenging than simply saying "I want someone smart". Furthermore, it misses one of the biggest points for a successful programmer - namely, Communication Skills! If a programmer can not articulate their understanding of the requirements and communicate back issues, concerns, and ideas, then you are taking a major risk. It doesn't matter that they COULD HAVE programmed the next BIG THING.... if they didn't understand the requirements, they will have wasted their time (and someone's money). And what about being able to work with the business and communicate ideas? How about time management and multitasking skills? I would hire a mediocre developer with solid communication skills and a willingness to learn over someone with top 1% programming talent who can't communicate a sentence properly. Ok, I'm done ranting.
After all, it does work! I mean, I can't wait to have to set the WEP Key on my wireless power router! "Honey, why did the power go out?" "Wait, I'm going to reset the router!"
Wouldn't it just be easier to show up naked at the airport with just your ID and a credit card? For one thing, your shoes will already be off :-)
Stop improving the technology and just change the business process!
I'm always amazed when I hear something positive like this that it hits me, "Wait, you mean they've been printing out tons of paper for years when they could have been doing this?!" Now the scary part is that I've read that Bush isn't really computer savvy. I wonder if he'll work off of hard copy?
Although I don't disagree at a high-level with Matt, this is also a bit of a stretch. The way I see it, Google's algorithm is far from perfect. All too often, I search for something and get results back from web sites that don't deserve to be at the top of the list but are not necessarily doing any kind of black-hat SEO. For whatever reason, Google incorrectly bestows traffic (and therefore revenue) to these sites that appear at the top. So would you blame someone who has a better web site from "pushing the envelope a bit"? To say that this behavior automatically constitutes some degree of moral decrepitude is a bit of a stretch. There are behaviors that are clearly wrong and I wholeheartedly disagree with them. But to expect perfection from the masses when Google's search results themselves are not perfect is a bit hypocritical in my view. Another way of putting it: It's easy for Google to sit back and say you do this and that to web site owners while Google's making Billions and so many sites are barely able to survive despite good quality content and top-notch intentions. Worse still is that Google has a "diversity problem" in my opinion. Top 10 search results will be from only 4 or 5 sites instead of from 10 different sites so you have more options to choose from. But what do I know.